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EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE.
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29. Medicine. The centre for clinical instruction is located at the Tan Tock Seng Hospital, where, under most unpromising conditions and unusual circumstances, the Professor of Medicine, by personal efforts, has gradually established and organised a medical teaching clinic of a remarkable and satisfactory kind. It is to this clinic that the students are posted as clinical clerks, and given every opportunity to acquire a thorough and intensive knowledge of clinical medicine at the bedside and in the laboratory. Clinical ward rounds by the Professor take place every morning, and a Tutor is present to help the students at all other times. Each student has opportunities to perform lumbar punctures, paracentesis of the chest and abdomen. Demonstrations of electro-cardiograms are also given. A laboratory has been organised and equipped, and the student has opportunities to carry out chemical and microscopical work necessary for diagnosis and treatment. He is taught to become familiar with malarial parasites, intestinal ova, and blood changes.
30. Recently an additional post of Associate Professor of Medicine has been established in the College, to which a specialist in Neurology has been appointed. A section of Neurology is now being developed, a new and admirable feature. The Associate Professor, in addition to systematic lectures and demonstrations in Neurology, assists the Professor in teaching general medicine and taking revision classes, and, as before stated, lectures on applied Pharmacology, Therapeutics, and Dietetics.
31. Instruction in Diseases of Children is given in the Children's Wards of the General Hospital, where clinics are held once a week, and each student is required to hold an appointment for at least one month as a clinical clerk. Provision for children has been doubled since 1934, and there are now two wards with 120 beds, cots, or cubicles for children under six years of age. The wards are in charge of an experienced and highly qualified specialist in Pediatrics. There are many claimants for admission, and the accommodation is strained to the stage of congestion. My impression was that the successful efforts to provide a means to alleviate the needs of suffering children in the wards of the General Hospital have clearly demonstrated the necessity for a separate and special Hospital for Children. I understand that a
So
July 21, 1939]
EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE.
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separate Children's Hospital of 200 or more beds is to be built, an admirable project of high importance and the first of its kind in the Far East to be associated with a teaching Hospital.
32. Surgery. In Surgery there are two Chairs, for a Professor of Surgery with duties at the General Hospital, and for a Pro- fessor of Clinical Surgery with duties at the Tan Tock Seng Hospital. Since 1934 each Chair has been filled by a new incumbent.
33. The course of systematic lectures in the principles and practice of surgery covers two years, and is given by the Pro- fessor of Surgery at the College of Medicine. The course of systematic lecture-demonstrations in Operative Surgery is given by the Professor of Clinical Surgery, and covers a period of two academic terms, one two-hour session per week being held. Demonstrations and selected operations are given on the cadaver, and students carry out exercises in operative surgery on the dead body. Practical instruction is limited to operations with which recently qualified doctors may reasonably be expected to be familiar.
34. Clinical teaching begins during the first term of the fourth year, when students attend at the General Hospital three days a week for instruction by the Clinical Tutor in clinical methods, and clinical investigation of patients. In addition students attend a short course of instruction, given by the Sister Tutor, in simple nursing procedures. Thereafter the students are posted to Tan Tock Seng Hospital or to the General Hospital as surgical dressers during the 4th, 5th, and 6th years, where every effort is made to ensure that ample opportunity is given for clinical work, and for the personal care and study of as many cases as possible.
35. During the final term, prior to the final examination, the student attends demonstrations in Surgery on two days a week in the wards of the General Hospital, and Tan Tock Seng Hospital.
36. Practically the whole of clinical tuition in Medicine, and more than half of that in Surgery, is given at Tan Tock Seng Hospital. In 1934 I inquired as to the reasons for utilising Tan
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